


It's Just a Story

by erbby17



Category: Free!
Genre: Fairy Tales, Fluff, M/M, Self Insert Fairy Tales, SouRin Week, Young Gou, Young Rin, Young Sousuke
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-15
Updated: 2015-09-15
Packaged: 2018-04-21 00:01:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4807274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/erbby17/pseuds/erbby17
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rin and Sousuke take a trip into various fairy tales, but neither seems to be fond of what tales the other has picked. Leave it to Gou to find a story that is just right!</p><p>For SouRin Week, Day 2: Paper (Fairy Tales)</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's Just a Story

_Jack grabbed the next highest branch and pulled himself up, shaking his red hair out of his eyes and he gazed at the sight above; the clouds were only so much higher than before and he giggled enthusiastically. Glancing down, he could barely see his house below._

_“Just you wait,” he yelled down. “I’ll show you a sight you’ve never seen!!” Although he knew they couldn’t hear him, Jack was excited to show his friends whatever incredible things he was going to retrieve from above the clouds, as well as the stories he was bound to tell. He continued his climb, taking in heavy breaths as the clouds grew closer until finally, his head poked through the white fluff. He climbed faster until the beanstalk took him to the cloudy floor above._

_All white surrounded him until he spotted an enormous castle in the distance. He poked out his foot and tested the sturdiness of the clouds. When the white fluff sprang back against his foot, Jack leapt from the beanstalk and landed on the soft surface. Without hesitation, he ran towards the castle._

_“Giants,” he whispered, hoping his feet would take him to the castle quicker. He arrived at the door, his legs shaking from the run. It towered above him and Jack could hardly make out the top of the doorframe. He pushed up against the door, hoping it would budge, but when it didn’t respond, he went for the alternative, and stuck his hands in the enormous gap. Pulling at the huge wooden door, he thought he could feel it move, and pulled harder when he felt that it did._

_Suddenly, the door knocked him to the cloudy ground, and Jack realized that something else had opened the door, something gigantic._

_The giant poked his head from behind the door, his teal eyes scanning the area in front of him, but not below where Jack was shivering in mixed excitement and fright._

_“Who…” the giant said in a deep voice the made the clouds vibrate violently. The giant turned his eyes downcast and they widened at the sight of Jack, trembling at the door. He reached down and scooped up Jack before…_

“What?! I am not a giant!!” Sousuke reached for the book, trying to pry it from Rin’s hands.

“Hey, I chose this story, Sousuke, let me finish it!”

Sousuke tugged at the book harder, but Rin wouldn’t let it leave his hands. “Not if you’re going to make me an ugly giant,” Sousuke said, with brow scrunched with agitation.

Rin smirked and looked down at the words that weren’t obscured by Sousuke’s hands. “The story doesn’t say that he’s ugly! And who says it was you?”

“Oh, come on, you’re obviously Jack, with that stupid ‘sight you’ve never seen’ line of yours,” Sousuke said, successfully snatching the book from Rin’s hands.

Rin’s cheeks turned pink as he laughed off Sousuke’s accusation. “Th-that’s what’s in the story!”

Sousuke scanned the pages Rin just read and stuck out his tongue. “Liar,” he said, flipping the pages of the worn book. “I’m choosing next.”

“It’s probably gonna be a dull one, most of them in there aren’t that good,” Rin said. The two boys had found the book in a run-down antique shop, in the same area where they often battled for frozen treats. Rin was excited to find that he had had enough pocket change to take it home. It seemed silly to Sousuke, but Rin had always really like fairy tales, and didn’t want to pass up the opportunity. Unfortunately, most of the stories in the book were kind of lame, but still, Rin liked to imagine himself in place of the heroes. 

He never thought Sousuke would play along, but his friend’s eyes lit up once he found a tale.

“Oh! This one is cool, it has a dragon in it,” he said, showing Rin the image of the dragon on all fours, breathing fire at the top of a European castle. Sousuke cleared his throat and began to read…

_The valiant knight, Sir Sousuke of Sano, rode on his horse into the night. The castle wasn’t too far ahead; the smell of smoke thickened as he rode deeper into the forest. Eventually, the castle loomed ahead, beyond the trees, and he dug his heels deeper into the sides of his horse, urging the beast to run faster. He brought the horse to a stop and swung off, running towards the burning moat; this dragon would be a fierce foe._

_“Fowl beast,” Sir Sousuke yelled, his voice echoing against the stone walls of the castle. “Show yourself and release your quarry, or I shall smite you in battle!!”_

_The dragon roared, still unseen, and the very ground at Sir Sousuke’s feet shook._

_“So be it,” he said below his breath, and Sir Sousuke unsheathed his sword. Grabbing a loose chain from the broken drawbridge, he swung through the fires of the moat and landed right at the castle door. He looked up, and in the highest window of the highest tower, he spotted the dragon’s captive._

_“Brave knight, save me!!”_

_The Princess Rin was a beautiful sight to behold, with radiant red hair, only gleaming more magnificent in the light of the dragon’s flames…_

Rin snatched the book and started to attack Sousuke, his face blending in to the color of his hair. “I! Am! Not! A! Princess!”

Laughing, Sousuke shielded himself from Rin’s blows. “Well, with your name…”

The fires from the story raged in Rin’s eyes. “That doesn’t mean I should be the princess!!!”

Sousuke groaned and slapped the book out of Rin’s hands, sending it gliding across the floor. “Fine, then you can be the dragon, and I’ll save Gou from the tower instead.”

“I don’t want to be a dragon!”

“Well, I had to be a gross giant! A dragon’s not so bad,” Sousuke said, crossing his arms.

Rin could tell Sousuke was getting bored with their activity, but he still wanted to find more stories. He pouted before he heard another voice join from the hallway.

“You two are so loud! What are you yelling about?” Gou stood in the doorway, her lips slanted in a grimace. “And why are you talking about me?”

Rin kicked the book as it sat on the ground and plopped onto his bed, crossing his arms. “We weren’t, we were just reading stories but Sousuke had to ruin it!”

“You ruined it first!!”

Gou, looking more intrigued, bent over and picked up the book. “Stories? What kind of stories?”

“Fairy tales,” Sousuke said. “But I’m going home now because your brother’s a jerk.”

Rin glared at Sousuke as his friend gathered his things from the corner of the room. Gou, on the other hand, was flipping through the pages looking rather interested by the tales.

“What about this one? The Little Mer…” Gou paused and looked between her brother and Sousuke before finishing her obviously altered title. “…person.”

“The Little Merperson?” Rin’s lip twitched in disgust. “No, Gou, we’re done with the stories…”

Gou shrugged her shoulders in haughty protest and sat on the floor, legs crossed, eager to start the story she had chosen. “Once upon a time, there was a fisherman…”

Rin cringed at the word, the main reason he had bypassed that story in the first place; his father’s death still stung him deep. Apparently, it didn’t have the same effect on Gou. She continued the story, her voice laced with wondrous enthusiasm…

 _Once upon a time, there was a fisherman. He was a humble man of simple pleasures, and fished only for his own personal needs. One day, after a very unlucky day at sea, he heard the most beautiful sound in the world. But as beautiful as it was, it stung at the fisherman’s heart and made him very sad. He followed the sound along the shore until he could identify it; someone was crying._

“Gee, I wonder who that could be,” Sousuke said, having joined Gou on the floor. He sneered at Rin.

“H-hey!!” Rin groaned and hunched over on his bed, beyond done with the fairy tale reading.

Gou cleared her throat rather loudly and glared at her brother. “I’m still reading…”

_The fisherman wondered why he would ever find the sound of crying to be so beautiful. Regardless, he continued his search when he came upon a sight he thought only possible in myths and legends._

_A stunning creature to behold sat upon the rocks at the end of the shore. It had the torso of a human, but below its hips was a fish’s tail, unlike any he had ever seen; its scales shimmered in shades of reds and pinks and the scales seemed to spread to the creature’s torso, random bits at elbows and on its neck. The creature, which could only have been a merperson, held its head in its hands, the wet strands of its bright red hair plastered to its face._

_The fisherman approached the merperson and upon reaching out, was met by shimmering eyes, as red as the scales; the merperson’s face was an even more beautiful sight._

_“Why do you cry,” said the fisherman._

_The merperson hesitated, but began the story, staring longingly out at the horizon. “I loved a human,” the merperson said, “and traded my voice for human legs at the chance to win his heart. But my love was not returned. Because of the rejection, my body returned to its true form, but at the setting of the third sun, my body will fade into foam and I will die.”_

_The fisherman was upset by the story. Why would such a beautiful creature be rejected? “And what sun is this?” The fisherman looked to the horizon, too, and noticed the setting sun._

_“Only the first one,” the merperson said. “I was rejected quickly.”_

_The fisherman reached out his hand and offered to take the merperson away from the shore. “Let me make your final moments worthwhile, then,” he said._

_The merperson took the fisherman’s hand and on the following day, the fisherman showed the merperson around the local village. He made sure to cover the merperson’s legs, so as not to scare the locals and by the setting of the second sun, the merperson thanked the fisherman with a bright smile._

_That night, the fisherman knew that he had fallen in love. On the following day, the fisherman took the merperson out again and although there was sadness between them, the fisherman could tell the merperson was thankful for his kind gestures._

_Before sunset, the fisherman took his rowboat and rowed the merperson out to sea. “Is there where you would like to die?”_

_“Yes,” said the merperson, jumping out of the boat and floating on the waters._

_The fisherman watched as the third sun began to set and opened his heart to the merperson. “I know it has only been a few days, but I have grown to love you,” he said._

_The merperson looked upon the fisherman and swam up to the side of the boat. Just as the third sun was setting, the merperson reached up to the fisherman and kissed him…_

“Ew, gross,” Rin said, gagging beneath his words. “Who’d wanna kiss a fish?”

“That’s what the story says, Rin!”

Sousuke laughed and winked at Rin. “She sounds just like you! No wonder you two are siblings.”

“Stop, I’m not done,” Gou yelled, trying to find her place in the book.

“I have to go home,” Sousuke said, scrunching up his face and grabbing his coat.

Gou looked up at Sousuke. “You don’t want to hear the rest?”

Sousuke shuffled his feet awkwardly and kept his eyes downcast. “No,” he choked out, and ran out of the room.

Rin sighed and fell back on his bed. “Stupid stories,” he said.

“Well, I’m gonna finish it,” Gou said, taking the book under her arm and getting up to leave the room.

“Have fun,” Rin said dryly, but in the back of his head, he wondered…

…what became of the merperson?

**Author's Note:**

> One of these tales might make a comeback this week. Stay tuned!!


End file.
